Back when Ai Weiwei was being interrogated over preposterous charges of pornography, Ai’s supporters started tweeting their breasts and crotches at him in support. Now, a similar protest is brewing for Iranian actress Golshifteh Farahani, who was allegedly banned from Iran for posing topless for French magazine Madame Le Figaro. Read more »
27-year-old Iranian activist, actress and filmmaker Kiana Firouz, currently residing in London, faces deportation back to Iran where she will be arrested, likely tortured and executed. Firouz’s “crime” is starring in Cul-de-Sac, a docu-styled film on lesbian life in Tehran. The Brit officials have rejected her application for asylum. Read more »
Unless you were living under the proverbial rock over the summer, you saw the 40-second video of Iranian student Neda Aghan-Soltan’s death during the uprising in that country after an obviously-rigged national election. The person who captured the video remains anonymous, probably because they fear extreme retribution from the Iranian government for sharing it with the world, but now that person has been awarded one of journalism’s highest honors for capturing the grainy footage on a cell phone. Read more »
The hardass Islamic conservatives running Iran’s government are moving towards making it illegal for men and women to congregate in public. That’ll go over well. |Jpost|
Authorities in Iran just can’t seem to keep up with all the various methods dissidents are using to challenge the June re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. They’ve banned art with the color green, have promised to crackdown on Students Days demonstrations, may have sent a cyber army to hack Twitter, and are now banning money that has been defaced with protest slogans. Citizens with vandalized currency must exchange it for new bills. Maybe the country is turning into one big police state? |AFP|
Anyone who uses Twitter can probably testify that the site was acting much weirder than usual yesterday. Maybe that has something to do with the fact that Twitter, one of the world’s most trafficked websites, had been hacked by a group calling themselves the “Iranian Cyber Army.” Read more »
Iranian artists have been blocked from shipping work for exhibition in the United States because the paintings contain the color green, according to the LA Times. “From the Streets of Iran” will still open tonight at Los Angeles’ Crewest Gallery, only without some of the emerald-colored urban art that Iranian postal inspectors decided was unsuitable to send. Worn by Mousavi supporters prior to the election, the color green has become a Twitter meme as well as a protest symbol against purported voting fraud. However, the color censorship has only strengthened the organizer’s resolve to go on with the show, still featuring some blatantly revolutionary themes that the censors failed to catch.
Images via Crewest
Although the media has mostly overblown the role that Twitter has played in the uprisings surrounding the Iranian elections with most people on the ground are still relying on SMS texts and good ol’ word of mouth, there’s no denying the impact its had on the micro-blogging community. From rappers to porn stars and celebrities, everyone’s getting in on the revolutionary action. And now with this Twitter application that automatically adds a green overlay to avatars, armchair activism has never been so convenient. ANIMAL decided to take a look at the eclectic mix of personalities who’ve gone green for the cause, see some of them below. Read more »
The revolution will be marginalized. While the concept of dissidents in Iran tweeting news and using the internet as a lifeline is endearing, there’s also those who are exploiting it for truly noble purposes.
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